Yer cannae change the laws of physics, Jim!
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Back in the days when I went to school, when the world was black and white and young ragamuffins spent their days acquiring soot stains from their travels up and down chimneys, I was taught the following: 1) The laws of physics are the same, everywhere in the universe 2) The laws of physics do not change Does anyone have any proof of either of these statements or are they assumptions? Rich
1. The laws of physics are the same, everywhere in the universe If you have an apple falling from a tree, you would be able to calculate the time it reaches earth by using Newton's famous equation. However, if the tree is sank under the water the equation would seem wrong. That's because we didn't considered all the other forces present, or, the equation was not complex enough (e.g. for the case we need to consider the relativistic effects). Generally, there is always a broader context that covers all facts, so you will be able to precisely calculate the apple falling under the water. The statement "The laws of physics are the same, everywhere in the universe." would be equivalent to "All that is, is what it is", which would be true. 2. The laws of physics do not change This is acctually the same question as the first. ...so they both are true :)
Alex C. D.
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Back in the days when I went to school, when the world was black and white and young ragamuffins spent their days acquiring soot stains from their travels up and down chimneys, I was taught the following: 1) The laws of physics are the same, everywhere in the universe 2) The laws of physics do not change Does anyone have any proof of either of these statements or are they assumptions? Rich
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Back in the days when I went to school, when the world was black and white and young ragamuffins spent their days acquiring soot stains from their travels up and down chimneys, I was taught the following: 1) The laws of physics are the same, everywhere in the universe 2) The laws of physics do not change Does anyone have any proof of either of these statements or are they assumptions? Rich
Of course the laws of Physics vary - ask any politian! Actually 'laws’ is sort of a misnomer, they are not laws, they are actually observations/interpretations made on how things interact. Once you look at them from that perspective there should be no surprises if they do alter or that we have got it completely wrong. After all Newtonian physics once explained most things .... (except for the price of apples). Even if we do get to a unified theory of everything, how can we be sure that it’s only another view point! Even with a proven unified theory, it still begs the ultimate question how did these laws come to be, probably a question that can never be answered. Even those in the Religious domain come up against similar theological problems, except they can leave it to their chosen God to ponder such questions!
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But the beer is flat. Not to mention the women.
The laws can change, our perception (and interpretation) of them can change, the world can change, but the actual physics stay the same. There may be laws that need amending or as yet haven't been written as in all legal matters.
The tragedy of your times is that you may get exactly what you want!
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Newtonian and Maxwellian mechanics don't work so well on small particles, like electrons. Quantum Mechanics doesn't work so well in the macro world we perceive with our senses. Heisenberg's uncertainty principle works well with small particles like electrons, but has no meaning when we are talking about a futbol. When you speak of the laws of physics, it usually depends on the size of the universe you are considering. We don't really have a unified theory that explains all things. The holy grail being the unified force theory. So, to answer your question, Newtonian laws apply to a futbol (or baseball), but Quantum physics applies to the atoms that make up the matter in the ball. And nuclear physics will hurt your head. Nuclear physics and Microsoft(R) Vista(R) should be avoided in order to have a nice day.
CodeWiz51 -- Life is not a spectator sport. I came to play. Code's Musings | Code's Articles
Good answer. Newtonian mechanics concentrates on the things that most people can see or do everyday. For example, if you play pool or snooker you should use Newtonian mechanics to work out where to hit balls with the cue ball to get them in the pockets. But Newtonian mechanics starts to break down at extremes. For the extremely small, quantum mechanics comes into play. If you start going fast, that's very fast (ie, you travel in a space rocket, not a fast car), start using Einstein's theories of relativity (also used for nuclear bombs, E = mc^2). If you go very big, ie, look at the cosmos - galaxies and the universe, then you start going into other theories, like string theory that models the universe as 11 or more dimensions. So, do the laws of physics change? No. But, they do break down at the extremes and new theories are written, tested, proved or disproved.
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Back in the days when I went to school, when the world was black and white and young ragamuffins spent their days acquiring soot stains from their travels up and down chimneys, I was taught the following: 1) The laws of physics are the same, everywhere in the universe 2) The laws of physics do not change Does anyone have any proof of either of these statements or are they assumptions? Rich
And not forgetting things like: Inflation - which requires the speed of light to have been very much higher during the very early universe (within about 10E-12s of the big bang), or for general relativity to have not held then.
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Newtonian and Maxwellian mechanics don't work so well on small particles, like electrons. Quantum Mechanics doesn't work so well in the macro world we perceive with our senses. Heisenberg's uncertainty principle works well with small particles like electrons, but has no meaning when we are talking about a futbol. When you speak of the laws of physics, it usually depends on the size of the universe you are considering. We don't really have a unified theory that explains all things. The holy grail being the unified force theory. So, to answer your question, Newtonian laws apply to a futbol (or baseball), but Quantum physics applies to the atoms that make up the matter in the ball. And nuclear physics will hurt your head. Nuclear physics and Microsoft(R) Vista(R) should be avoided in order to have a nice day.
CodeWiz51 -- Life is not a spectator sport. I came to play. Code's Musings | Code's Articles
I just thinks it's all relative... Hee, Hee :-D Actually I try to not be too certain about anything. The only things I have seen that are constant are: 1. Change - everything in this reality changes continually 2. Humans resist change more that anything else - we are the Universal Yang to the Cosmic Ying. Everything else is up for debate. That is not to invite anarchy, but to recognize that existence in this reality is dynamic, always in flux and that balance & harmony are moving targets. They have to be, because lack of any movement or flux is stagnation; stagnation is lifeless.
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I'll be ..... I just threw out my physics, astronomy and cosmology library and bought a bunch of bibles! And everyone: the Universe was not created by the Big Bing. It took just 7 days for everything to be created and all started on 23rd October 4004BC. I wonder if they had all necessary development permits! "Think of how many religions attempt to validate themselves with prophecy. Think of how many people rely on these prophecies, however vague, however unfulfilled, to support or prop up their beliefs. Yet has there ever been a religion with the prophetic accuracy and reliability of science? ... No other human institution comes close. " - Carl Sagan, The Demon Haunted World.
No trees were killed in the creation of this message. However, many electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
iangrech wrote:
I'll be ..... I just threw out my physics, astronomy and cosmology library and bought a bunch of bibles! And everyone: the Universe was not created by the Big Bing.
There was a theory that Bing Crosby created the universe?
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Back in the days when I went to school, when the world was black and white and young ragamuffins spent their days acquiring soot stains from their travels up and down chimneys, I was taught the following: 1) The laws of physics are the same, everywhere in the universe 2) The laws of physics do not change Does anyone have any proof of either of these statements or are they assumptions? Rich
Easy by definition: In physics, if it changes with the location or over time, it is not a law. :D
We are a big screwed up dysfunctional psychotic happy family - some more screwed up, others more happy, but everybody's psychotic joint venture definition of CP
blog: TDD - the Aha! | Linkify!| FoldWithUs! | sighist -
Easy by definition: In physics, if it changes with the location or over time, it is not a law. :D
We are a big screwed up dysfunctional psychotic happy family - some more screwed up, others more happy, but everybody's psychotic joint venture definition of CP
blog: TDD - the Aha! | Linkify!| FoldWithUs! | sighistUnless of course the law states that there will be a change, and in turn can define the change in mathematical terms...
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iangrech wrote:
I'll be ..... I just threw out my physics, astronomy and cosmology library and bought a bunch of bibles! And everyone: the Universe was not created by the Big Bing.
There was a theory that Bing Crosby created the universe?
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No politicians means no political structure. This means no organized society which is called anarchy. I don't believe anarchy is the solution to war.
“Cannot find REALITY.SYS...Universe Halted.” ~ God on phone with Microsoft Customer Support
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Back in the days when I went to school, when the world was black and white and young ragamuffins spent their days acquiring soot stains from their travels up and down chimneys, I was taught the following: 1) The laws of physics are the same, everywhere in the universe 2) The laws of physics do not change Does anyone have any proof of either of these statements or are they assumptions? Rich
I think most physicists would put both of those statements in the category of reasonably well supported assumptions. Astronomical observations of distant objects are the best evidence we have in support of both. If these observations aren't anomalous then it's likely that physical law is homogeneous throughout space-time. That being said there are some important points to keep in mind about observations of distant objects: 1) they are actually observations of the past. 2) they are necessarily more limited then observations made in local space-time.
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Back in the days when I went to school, when the world was black and white and young ragamuffins spent their days acquiring soot stains from their travels up and down chimneys, I was taught the following: 1) The laws of physics are the same, everywhere in the universe 2) The laws of physics do not change Does anyone have any proof of either of these statements or are they assumptions? Rich
Well, seeing as most of what we call 'Laws of Physics' are just human inventions, I would say that they can and do change, and therefore are not the same everywhere. Newton invented Gravity - it did not exist before him. I recommend reading "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance". ~R
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Back in the days when I went to school, when the world was black and white and young ragamuffins spent their days acquiring soot stains from their travels up and down chimneys, I was taught the following: 1) The laws of physics are the same, everywhere in the universe 2) The laws of physics do not change Does anyone have any proof of either of these statements or are they assumptions? Rich
This is philosophical question. :D But this is what science is: we explain reallity by models. So more knowledge comes to light and we start to need other models, to replace the older ones. It is a good start to assume the 2 items you listed before. But they are valid only in this model. Well, this is what I think. ;)
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Back in the days when I went to school, when the world was black and white and young ragamuffins spent their days acquiring soot stains from their travels up and down chimneys, I was taught the following: 1) The laws of physics are the same, everywhere in the universe 2) The laws of physics do not change Does anyone have any proof of either of these statements or are they assumptions? Rich
- The laws of physics are the same, everywhere in the universe
- The laws of physics do not change
Does anyone have any proof of either of these statements or are they assumptions?
The answer depends on your world view: a) Materialism, i.e. there is no God: No, your 1) and 2) cannot be proven, they are considered constant only because our observations and experiments agree with them being constant (currently and viewed from earth), however, there is no logical reason why this invariance should continue in the future. b) Christian Theism, i.e. there is a God and He intended for people to live on earth and to be able to figure out that we are here for a purpose. Yes, your 1) and 2) can at least be assumed, because the laws of physics are extremely finely tuned to allow life to exist ( http://www.leaderu.com/science/ross-justright.html ), and being tuned by God makes it logical that they stay the way they are, i.e. something that was carefully built stays the way it is. It would only change if the builder makes revisions.
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Back in the days when I went to school, when the world was black and white and young ragamuffins spent their days acquiring soot stains from their travels up and down chimneys, I was taught the following: 1) The laws of physics are the same, everywhere in the universe 2) The laws of physics do not change Does anyone have any proof of either of these statements or are they assumptions? Rich
I actually have a degree in theoretical physics so I can answer this. The laws of physics are the same everywhere comes from applications Noether's theorem (technical stuff to do with symmetry and conserved currents) - for example if conservation of mementum is true anywhere then it must be true under any translation (i.e. everywhere). If conservation of angualr momentum is true anywhere the it must be true under any rotation (i.e. in any direction). From (formally nasty complex mathematical) statements like these we conclude that the laws of physics are the same everywhere. The laws of physics don't change - much trickier. If you mean conservation of memntum is always true and always was then yes, BUT if you mean the speed of light is was and ever shall be ~3.0e8 m/s then thats an open question. There is a whole group of theories that require various constants to have changed or still be changing. There is another aspect too - you might think conservation of energy would give you constancy of the laws of physics over time, but we know that conservation of what we normally call energy is only approximate, it is absolutely not true on either the largest or the smallest scales.
Using the latest technology to create tomorrows problems today.
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There wasn't any gasoline in 1066, but King Harold got an arrow in his eye in, erm, a war.
.\\axxx
gasoline wouldnt be there but there would be something equivalent which caused the war. People have been fighting for materialistic things all over the history.
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I'll be ..... I just threw out my physics, astronomy and cosmology library and bought a bunch of bibles! And everyone: the Universe was not created by the Big Bing. It took just 7 days for everything to be created and all started on 23rd October 4004BC. I wonder if they had all necessary development permits! "Think of how many religions attempt to validate themselves with prophecy. Think of how many people rely on these prophecies, however vague, however unfulfilled, to support or prop up their beliefs. Yet has there ever been a religion with the prophetic accuracy and reliability of science? ... No other human institution comes close. " - Carl Sagan, The Demon Haunted World.
No trees were killed in the creation of this message. However, many electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
iangrech wrote:
"Think of how many religions attempt to validate themselves with prophecy. Think of how many people rely on these prophecies, however vague, however unfulfilled, to support or prop up their beliefs. Yet has there ever been a religion with the prophetic accuracy and reliability of science? ... No other human institution comes close. " - Carl Sagan, The Demon Haunted World.
Hmmm, someone obviously never read the book of Daniel (for starters).
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There are many astronomical observations that agree with those statements. Things like spectra of stars, observed motion of stars within a galaxy and many other observations point to that being true. Those are only observations not experiments The vast majority of all experiments have been done at the surface of the Earth, and the most distant experiments from Earth have all been done with unmanned probes, and all of them within our tiny solar system. The current set of laws for describing the universe has gone from a hand crafted assembly or C++ application to the bloated enterprisy conglomeration of VB modules that is the standard model. Everyone wants there to be something simpler, nobody knows what it is, but perhaps finding it has to do with questioning assumptions like those.
I can imagine the sinking feeling one would have after ordering my book, only to find a laughably ridiculous theory with demented logic once the book arrives - Mark McCutcheon
I wish people would stop alluding to the van Nistelrooy goal against Italy; the section quoted is clearly discussing the offside law.
Andy Brummer wrote:
Everyone wants there to be something simpler, nobody knows what it is, but perhaps finding it has to do with questioning assumptions like those.
